Word Of The Day

[Altobelli]

DEBONAIR adjective (deb-uh-nair)


adjective
1. courteous, gracious, and having a sophisticated charm: a debonair gentleman.
2. jaunty; carefree; sprightly.


Quotes

He was a tall, thin man, with gray hair swept back and a debonair ease of movement that suggested wealth, confidence, and success.
--*Jacqueline Winspear,*Pardonable Lies, 2005


What could be simpler than to toddle down one flight of stairs and in an easy and debonair manner ask the chappie's permission to use his telephone?
--*P. G. Wodehouse,*Indiscretions of Archie, 1921



Origin

The adjective debonair, from Old French debonaire, originated in Old French as the phrase de bon aire “of good lineage.” The aire of that phrase comes from the Latin noun ager “field,” which presumably meant “nest” in Vulgar Latin. Debonair entered English in the 13th century.

[Altobelli]

CAMPCRAFT noun (kamp-kraft)

noun
1. the art of outdoor camping.


Quotes

Daniel Boone, Kit Carson and the other old fellows we admire so much could never have lived a week in the wilderness had they not known all the ins and outs of campcraft--that is, the art of taking care of themselves in the wilderness and of making themselves as comfortable as conditions would permit under canvas or in the open.
--*Dillon Wallace,*"How to Be a Good Camper," Boys' Life, July 1914


Inman squatted in the brush and watched the folks go about their campcraft.
--*Charles Frazier,*Cold Mountain, 1997



Origin

Campcraft is a straightforward compound noun. Camp ultimately derives from Latin campus “field, plain,” especially the Campus Martius “the field of Mars” (so called from the altar dedicated to Mars), which was originally pastureland between the Tiber River and the northwest boundary of Rome. The Campus Martius was used for recreation and exercise, various civilian meetings, and army musters and military exercises. Craft is a common Germanic word: cræft in Old English, Kraft in German, kraft in Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish. All of the Germanic languages except English have maintained the original meaning “strength, power”; only English has developed the sense “skill, skilled occupation.” Campcraft entered English in the 20th century.

[Altobelli]

FIZGIG noun (fiz-gig)

noun
1. a type of firework that makes a loud hissing sound.
2. a whirling toy that makes a whizzing noise.
3. fishgig.


Quotes

Neither powder nor pepper (you know) was adulterated in those days, and if you made a fizgig, why it blossomed and starred like a golden thistle, flashed into a myriad sparklets like a tiny fountain for Queen Mab and her troupe to dance round.
--*Frank Fowler,*Last Gleanings, 1864


What sputters green and blue, this fizgig called Fifine!
--*Robert Browning,*Fifine at the Fair, 1872



Origin

Fizgig has a very cloudy history. The first syllable, fiz (also fis), may derive from the Middle English noun fise or feist “a fart” (cf. fizzle), from the Proto-Indo-European root pezd- “fart,” source of Latin pēdere, Greek bdeîn, and Polish bździeć, all meaning “to fart,” which well fits the sound made by the firework. Gig may be imitative in origin, but the word or words are very problematic, and it is less difficult to state what gig does not mean than what it does mean: “a flighty, giddy girl (cf. giglet, giggle); a top (i.e., the toy); “odd-looking character, a fool; a joke, merriment.” Fizgig entered English in the 16th century.

[Altobelli]

PLANTIGRADE adjective (plan-ti-greyd)


adjective
1. walking on the whole sole of the foot, as humans, and bears.

noun
1. a plantigrade animal.


Quotes

When later the old man slipped back into the night, the bear lifted itself and nosed briefly about its prison and the open gate, then walked out favoring one leg, its plantigrade shuffle derelict and comic in the darkness.
--*Robert Herring,*McCampbell's War, 1986


Cats and many other carnivores walk upright on their toes, a stance known as digitigrade, as opposed to the plantigrade stance found in humans and bears.
--*Kevin Hansen,*Bobcat: Master of Survival, 2007



Origin

The adjective plantigrade comes from the Latin noun planta “sole (of the foot)” and the verb gradī “to take steps, step, walk.” The Proto-Indo-European root ghredh- “to step, stride” is not very common, and all current English words are borrowings from Latin, e.g., gradual, grade, and verbs ending in -gress, e.g., ingress, regress, transgress. Planta, however, is another story: it shows the infix n, but its Proto-Indo-European root is the very common plat-, plet-, plot- “flat, broad.” Plat- is the source of the Lithuanian adjective platùs “wide, broad,” the all but identical Greek adjective platýs “flat, wide” (as in platypus "flatfoot"), the English adjective and noun flat, the noun flet (also flett) “dwelling, hall,” familiar to readers of Beowulf and J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings (probably the same crowd), and flan (the Spanish custard). Plantigrade entered English in the 19th century.

[Altobelli]

BRAVURA noun (bruh-vyoor-uh)

noun
1. a display of daring; brilliant performance.
2. Music. a florid passage or piece requiring great skill and spirit in the performer.

adjective
1. Music. spirited; florid; brilliant (applied chiefly to vocal but occasionally to instrumental compositions).


Quotes
"Nothing wins more loyalty for a leader than an air of bravura," the Duke said. "I, therefore, cultivate an air of bravura."
--*Frank Herbert,*Dune, 1965


The acting, though by no means homogeneous, has its share of bravura.
--*John Simon,*"False 'Messiah,' Fake 'Diamonds'," New York, January 7, 1985



Origin

The noun bravura is still unnaturalized in English. The word is obviously Italian, ultimately derived from the adjective bravo, which French borrowed from Italian as brave (English brave comes from French). Further etymology of bravo is unclear: some claim it to be from an assumed Vulgar Latin brabus (Latin barbarus) “barbarian” (Roman authors remarked on the impetuous bravery of Celtic and Germanic warriors). The Italian suffix -ura (-ure in French) comes from the Latin noun suffix -ūra. Bravura entered English in the 18th century.

[Altobelli]

EDENTATE adjective (ee-den-teyt)

adjective
1. toothless.
2. belonging or pertaining to the Edentata, an order of New World mammals characterized by the absence of incisors and canines in the arrangement of teeth and comprising the armadillos, the sloths, and the South American anteaters.

noun
1. an edentate mammal.


Quotes

As would have been the case a million years ago, a typical colonist can expect to be edentate by the time he or she is thirty years old, having suffered many skull-cracking toothaches on the way.
--*Kurt Vonnegut,*Galápagos, 1985


Anyway, an edentate man led a bloated, mouth-foaming goat down a road webbed with knee-deep gullies.
--*Aleksandar Hemon,*The Lazarus Project, 2008



Origin

Edentate means “lacking teeth, toothless,” a neutral term; it is also used in taxonomic names for an order of mammals lacking front teeth, e.g. sloths, armadillos, another neutral sense. The origin of edentate is the Latin adjective ēdentātus, the past participle of the verb ēdentāre “to knock (someone’s) teeth out,” definitely not a neutral sense. Edentate entered English in the 19th century.

[Altobelli]

MAKEBATE noun (meyk-beyt)

noun
1. Archaic. a person who causes contention or discord.


Quotes

... he was no makebate or stirrer up of quarrels; he would rather be a peacemaker.
--*Sir Walter Scott,*A Legend of Montrose, 1819


Trying to set you against me, the spiteful old make-bate, and no one knows how long she will be here ...
--*Charlotte Mary Yonge,*Under the Storm, 1887



Origin

The rare noun makebate comes from the common English verb make and the uncommon, obsolete noun bate “strife, discord,” a derivative of the Middle English verb baten “to argue, contend; (of a bird) to beat the wings” (cf. abate), a borrowing from Old French batre “to beat.” Makebate entered English in the 16th century.

[Balanbam00]

............. if a flower is “sweet-scenting” or “sweet-scented”???

[Altobelli]

SOLECISM noun (sol-uh-siz-uhm)

noun
1. a nonstandard or ungrammatical usage, as unflammable and they was.
2. breach of good manners or etiquette.
3. any error, impropriety, or inconsistency.


Quotes

... Lee finds in the solecism of “less” for “fewer”—catnip for pedants, and familiar to anyone who has stood in a grocery-store express lane—the inspiration for a beautiful poem about growing old ...
--*Dan Chiasson,*"'The Undressing': Poetry of Passion Laid Bare," The New Yorker, March 19, 2018


And a single word couldn’t be a dead giveaway either, no matter how much people would like to portray the use of pled rather than pleaded as an obvious Trumpian solecism, especially when Dowd himself has been documented using pled at least once.
--*Ben Zimmer,*"Can Forensic Linguistics Pin Down the Author of a Trump Tweet?" Atlantic, December 8, 2017



Origin

The noun solecism ultimately derives from Greek soloikismós “incorrect use of (Attic) Greek; incorrect use of language” (whether of individual words or in syntax), later “incorrect reasoning in logic,” and finally, “awkwardness.” Soloikismós is a derivative of the adjective sóloikos “speaking incorrectly, speaking broken Greek,” then “having bad manners, in bad taste, awkward.” Sóloikos traditionally derives from Sóloi, a colony on the southern shore of modern Turkey, not far from Tarsus where St. Paul was born. Sóloi, however, was not founded by the Athenians (who spoke Attic Greek) but by the Argives and Rhodians, who spoke Doric dialects. Perhaps whichever Athenian colonists were there originally wound up speaking a mixed dialect, or perhaps the Sóloikoi have been getting an undeserved bum rap for the past few millennia. Solecism entered English in the 16th century.

[oldcolner]

HOCHMAGANDY
Old Scots word for fornication. Used by Robbie Burns

As we’re playing Aberdeen it’s time for some Doric lessons too eg

There’ll be no hochmagandy on this boat. Quines this wye loons thon wye.”

Quines is Doric for ladies or women

Loons is Doric for men or lads